


Prizes over Discovery (II)

by Keiko Kirin (sakana17)



Series: Prizes over Discovery [2]
Category: Master and Commander (movie), Master and Commander - O'Brian
Genre: Age of Sail, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2003-12-27
Updated: 2003-12-27
Packaged: 2017-10-03 20:55:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22127
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sakana17/pseuds/Keiko%20Kirin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Many thanks to Thevetia for her sound advice and for all those trips to the movie theater.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Prizes over Discovery (II)

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to Thevetia for her sound advice and for all those trips to the movie theater.

Stephen Maturin had made two promises to himself when he embarked upon this mad intimacy with Jack Aubrey: there would be no sodomy, and they would never meet intimately on land. Already he had broken one promise.

The _Surprise_ had met the prize ship _Hierophant_, captained by an old friend of Jack's, off the coast of Tristan da Cunha and was obliged to escort her home. Their last night out, Jack, having returned from a merry evening with Captain Worthy on the _Hierophant_, had called for Stephen to join him for coffee in the great cabin. Jack had smelled of wine, but he was so affectionate and so amorous that Stephen found he could not resist his kisses. Soon the door was shut fast, and they were stripped to their shirts, and Jack had murmured into Stephen's ear, "You may bugger me if you like." He was drunk, Stephen had thought, but he was not so drunk that he didn't observe Stephen's hesitation -- as well as his interest -- and answer it with sincere certainty. His will had been set on it, and as so often happened, Stephen discovered that Jack's will was very close to his own. And so Stephen's first private promise had been broken in a fervent yet sweet coupling, more strange and perfect than Stephen could ever have imagined. One which had fully pleased Jack and left him in a very good humour.

Now, some months later, Stephen perceived that he was about to break the second promise, as he stepped aside for Aubrey -- windswept, restless, and wet in a great cloak -- to enter his rooms. Jack took off his hat, and his hair was a mess barely held by his ribbon. He turned as Stephen locked the door; his look was wild and amused and avaricious. Stephen sought a joke to make, some few words to draw a line between them so that Stephen could master his passion as well as his territory. It was hopeless. No words would come, and so without words they met in an embrace and a kiss.

Jack was hungry and impatient, and his unusual silence inflamed Stephen, who at once felt a need to touch him and claim him and tame him. But there was to be no taming. They clutched one another as if in war or desperate solace, grasping and tearing at clothes until they were naked before the fire burning low. Jack would have pulled Stephen to the floor to finish it, Stephen saw this. With the remains of his self-control, he took Jack by the hand and took him to his bed, and there Jack lay down before him in offering, and a fierce offering it was. Jack was roused as if in the middle of battle, and fought somewhat, grappling with his great strong hands and legs as Stephen took him as fearsomely as Jack desired. Jack was never tamed, but he was brought to calmness at last after the last great shudders waned. Sweaty and spent, he embraced Stephen and laughed softly in his ear.

Stephen rose and washed from the basin, wrapped himself in a dressing gown, and lit the candle by the bed where Jack was spread out as if it were his own. Stephen sat down beside him, shaking his head before placing his hand on Jack's brow and combing his fingers through the tangle of unruly gold hair. Jack was relaxed and lazy, but his manner was solemn, his thoughts elsewhere.

"What sent you from Ashgrove?" Stephen asked.

Jack's face went dark and serious. "It's a very sore business."

Stephen paused, wondering whether to press the question, then said lightly, "So I've been given to understand, but that has not seemed to diminish your enjoyment of it."

"Stephen!" Jack looked up at him in feigned shock, the illusion fading as he smiled broadly. "That was very near a pun, you know."

"None of it. Join me in a cigar?"

"Thankee, yes," said Jack, taking the cigar from Stephen's fingers. They shared the cigar with Jack resting his head against Stephen's thigh.

"It's Sophie's mother," Jack said at last. "I don't suppose you would want her for dissecting?" he asked with uncharacteristic meanness. Stephen, who knew Mrs Williams, thought it was not entirely undeserved.

"The barmaid in town has had a child. A boy with yellow hair and blue eyes, and somehow Sophie's mother heard of it." Stephen lifted the cigar from Jack's fingers and took a long draw on it. Jack tilted his head back and said earnestly, "I never touched her! I wasn't even ashore at the time, but that matters not to these blasted women. Now Sophie's all ahoo, and your Diana was no help at all, siding with Sophie like that," he added.

His Diana! As if such a creature had ever existed, or ever would. Stephen shifted, sucking on the cigar.

"So I felt the necessity of escape," Jack said, "and decided to run up and see the Admiralty." He stretched languorously and reached for the cigar, and Stephen thought him a fine picture of sin and temptation with his golden and scarred naked body, loose hair, and pretty lips exhaling smoke.

"This is not the Admiralty," Stephen observed, drawing the dressing gown around him more tightly.

"Heaven forbid," Jack said jovially, kissing Stephen's neck as he handed him the cigar. Stephen finished it without further sharing. Jack pulled the bedcovers up and yawned, and it was clear he intended to stay, uninvited. Stephen stabbed the cigar against the bedpost and considered sending him off, but when he saw Jack's head on the pillow, covered in a lace of yellow hair, eyes closed and lips parted, he knew that he could no more do that than he could keep the particular promises he had made to himself.

\-----

When Jack woke in the morning, he smelled coffee and, dressing quickly, he stepped into the parlour to discover Stephen sitting at a small table with toast, eggs and ham, and coffee. He also saw the coverlet on the sofa and sitting down at the table he said, "I didn't mean to cast you from your bed, Stephen."

Stephen was reading a letter rather intently and didn't immediately answer, so Jack helped himself to the remaining ham and eggs and was drinking his second cup when Stephen said, "And so you didn't, my dear; but better to make it appear so, for the sake of the landlady." He looked at Jack over his letter, spectacles pushed to the end of his nose, and Jack shifted in his chair, feeling somewhat like Stephen was gently scolding him, but for what he had no hint. Not that Stephen wasn't right to be cautious, but it did cast a dreary pall when he spoke of it so plainly. Jack bit into his third piece of toast, and Stephen lowered the letter.

"Have you eaten my breakfast, Aubrey, you creature?" he cried, snatching the the toast out of Jack's fingers.

"Your breakfast?" Jack tried to smile. "I thought I should find you finishing a bowl of gruel. I thought this was for me."

Stephen muttered, "The ham was for you," and picked up his letter again. Jack, perceiving that he would not be able to mend this broken stay this morning, finished his coffee, said good-bye, kissed Stephen on the cheek, and walked to the Admiralty in the rain.

It was very hard, he thought. He had escaped one household full of damning looks and silence only to find Stephen taken by whims. He did not believe the breakfast had been his only misstep. He reviewed the previous evening, and did not find any indication that Stephen had been unwilling or less than welcoming. Indeed... Jack flushed warm to think on it, and was glad that he was outside in the cold, brisk, miserable London air. He needed a ship. They both needed a ship. It was always so very hard being on land, he reflected as he stood in front of the Admiralty and sighed, straightening his hat.

After a long and unsuccessful day, he walked back in the dark, feeling very low. He dined at a tavern so as not to give Stephen any cause for complaint, stopped at the club hoping to find an old friend who would happen to know of a ship needing a captain and a surgeon, and arrived at Stephen's door much later than he had intended. He knocked and waited, and when the door opened, he looked at his friend. The dim light gave Stephen's cheeks more colour and deepened the shadows at the corners of his mouth, making him appear to smile. He wore a dressing gown over his clothes and there were ink-stains on his fingertips resting against the door. He gazed at Jack with his head slightly tilted, and although his eyes were pale, Jack was ever reminded of stormy seas when they looked at him in this way. Stephen's look thrilled him, and he almost forgot himself and pulled Stephen into a kiss.

Stephen narrowed one eye and stepped aside to let him in. Jack cast a glance around the room to make sure they were alone, and as soon as Stephen had locked the door, Jack grasped him and embraced him and claimed him in a kiss. Stephen responded immediately and perfectly. It was as if the previous night continued, never broken by sleep, breakfast, or the Admiralty. Soon they were naked; soon they were in Stephen's bed. Soon Stephen was inside him and bearing down with all his force, and Jack felt a strange calm like the inside of a hurricane: restless waves and uneasy airs, but peace all the same. He reached to touch Stephen's cheek. Stephen took his hand and kissed the palm, and their ferocity faded off. Their passion became slow and gentle and tidal: wave after wave crashing until the great wave hit and retreated.

Afterward, Jack sighed and stretched and wished Stephen would offer him a cigar; it would taste so good just now. Stephen, however, was in a quiet mood, and had not stirred after returning to the bed in his dressing gown, whose usefulness Jack questioned, given how it spilled open, exposing most of Stephen to the candlelit room. Jack thought Stephen looked somewhat decadent like this, especially now, as he raised one thigh and bent his knee. Jack cast about for a jest to make, to relieve the silence, but he found none, and he doubted Stephen would welcome one.

"Could we not have a cigar together, love?" he asked at last, tentatively, for memories of breakfast had returned to him. Stephen smiled and lit one, and they shared it companionably. Jack felt very satisfied and content, as this was so like their many nights together, playing cards or music or simply replacing conversation with company. So like, but for the one thing, of course, he reflected.

He rested his head on Stephen's belly, and Stephen stroked his hair and gave him the last of the cigar. "And have you a ship?" Stephen asked.

Jack attempted to blow a ring of smoke. "No, no, my dear. You know what slow fellows they are."

"Even in war?" Stephen asked. He twisted Jack's hair around his fingers.

"Especially in war," Jack said with a frown, for he felt disloyal admitting it, despite its obvious truth. "There is such a number of captains waiting, and all those favours to be given. And a smaller number of ships than one would wish." He discarded the dregs end of the cigar.

Stephen tugged Jack's hair and asked, "Why do they not build a ship for every captain? Then you should have the _Surprise_ always. None of this waiting and begging for a miserly fourth rate boat."

Jack chuckled low. A fourth rate! He had no hopes of a fourth rate at his current progress of advancement. He sat up, kissed Stephen's cheek, and said affectionately, "My dear Stephen, what a curious fellow you are. A ship for every captain! England would be nothing but ships." He drew the bedcovers up, imagining an England made of floating ships; how nice that would be; except where would they put the women, women were so unlucky on a ship. This last thought reminded him, with a pang, of Sophie and their quarrel. He felt very weary.

He would have fallen asleep had he not remembered Stephen's manner over breakfast. He looked at Stephen and said, "I am sorry for boarding you so unannounced. Do you wish me to sleep in the parlour?"

Stephen gazed at him tenderly and kissed his forehead. "Never in life, my dear." Reassured, Jack closed his eyes and was instantly asleep.

\-----

Stephen woke in the silent, dead hours of night, quite awake. He crept from the bed without disturbing Jack, wrapped his dressing gown around himself, and sat in the parlour after making a small fire. In the pocket of his gown was the letter, folded small, written in Diana's hand and addressed to "Maturin," telling him to "send that ass Aubrey home" for she could not bear Sophie's self-pity, it was so very tiresome.

Stephen had hoped, dimly and secretively, that Jack would come home with a ship, sparing him from the decision. With a ship, Jack would hurry home to prepare and make whatever peace with Sophie that he could. But the Admiralty had not obliged, might never oblige, and Stephen was left with the letter on his lap. With Jack in London, despite Stephen's strongest resolutions -- not so very strong, after all -- they would continue to meet, they would continue to bed. It was very foolish; of course, he must send Jack home. His decision satisfied him, but did not please him. He stared into the fire for a while, restless mind reflecting on Diana's handwriting and Jack's snoring and the great warm weight of him in bed, then he rose and went to his escritoire for the bottle of laudanum. He counted out a small dose, no more than four-hundred drops, swallowed it, and returned to the sofa. It was here that he was roused from sleep in the obnoxiously bright morning by Jack leaning over and kissing him, fully dressed and in his cloak, saying he had every hope today, every hope of a ship, had not given up yet.

The morning was clear but cold, and Stephen poked at the fire, called for hot coffee, and was in a sullen, brutish bad mood until the afternoon, when he attended a most informative lecture on Patagonian flora and met some learned friends and colleagues. After dining with one acquaintance, a pleasant but uninspiring earwig enthusiast, Stephen found the evening air moist and warmer. He walked home on a path he realised too late took him past the Admiralty.

_Dei rident_, he thought with bitter amusement; for while he walked across the way from the grand building, he saw the unmistakable figure of Jack Aubrey step into the street, with two other men Stephen did not know and did not give much attention. He slowed his steps, sliding effortlessly and almost without conscious notice into his demi-professional skills, wholly absorbed in watching Aubrey; he stepped back into a well of shadows.

At first his observation was mere admiring indulgence. Jack cut a fine, dashing figure. He flung his cloak over his shoulders with unaffected ease and a grace of movement seldom seen in men, rarely seen in men of Jack's size. His clubbed yellow hair was remarkable: pale in the night, it made a fine ornament to his shoulder and back. He was talking to the men with him, talking loud and with mirth, but Stephen did not strain to listen. The words did not matter. It was the voice, so familiar and beloved that deep inside Stephen felt a pull, a stirring to go nearer and be in its presence and hear again the undisguised, open affection in the phrase oft repeated, "Oh, there you are, Stephen," and be warmed by it.

The flow of the voice stopped; one of the other men was speaking, and the contrast was jarring to Stephen. A metallic, whining, almost mechanical voice. But whatever it said made Jack laugh. A hearty, deep, entertained laugh, perhaps with a touch of knowingness, of embarrassed worldliness to it -- the laugh of a gentleman sea captain who knows very well the debauchery and depravity of the world but endeavours not to find it humourous, thinking this would mark him, in Jack's words, a scrub or something even lower.

The laugh signalled the end of the meeting in the street, and the two unknown men hailed a carriage, tipped their hats to Jack, and departed in the opposite direction. Now Stephen witnessed Jack's unexpected change of demeanour. Until this moment, from Jack's happy voice and laughter, Stephen had supposed Jack had gotten his ship. Indeed, buried beneath Stephen's observations and aesthetic appreciation was the relief that he had been spared the task of sending Jack home to Sophie.

Jack pulled his cloak around him tightly and fixed his hat lower. He turned in the direction of Stephen's lodgings and walked in a steady, determined gait, yet without hurry. Stephen did not have to see his face to imagine the grim look there. He could read very well the shape of Jack's back, the mood of his stride. There could be no doubt: no ship.

Stephen watched Jack's figure retreat until Jack turned a corner. He felt a strong temptation to catch up with him, lay his arms about him, and curse the lords of the Navy for the blind old fools they were. An elaborate curse, with parts in Latin and Spanish for Jack's benefit, for he knew Jack harboured a sailor's obscure superstitious awe of curses in foreign tongues.

And then, he thought, having lightened Jack's mood and caused him to smile, they would return to Stephen's lodgings and find further comfort in kisses and touch. They would lie with each other in Stephen's cold bed until the sheets wilted from Jack's great and generous heat. And Jack would laugh, softly, a private, private laugh for Stephen's ears only, his sweaty breath on Stephen's neck and shoulder. A laugh more knowing than the other, but so pure in spite of it; laughing in the wonder of happiness, love, satisfaction, and temporary satiation. That moment was bliss, moreso than the crude and utterly predictable physical state of release. It was the bliss poetry spoke of, and music attained to, and all other forms of art and thought failed to capture.

Stephen had been staring at the corner where Jack had turned for some moments, and it had started to rain. A light drizzle, no more. He moved from the shadows and slowly walked down the street, thoughts moving from bliss to chilly, self-serving indecision. He did not harbour guilt for the act itself; that would be the height of hypocrisy. Nor did he believe it any great sin. He had seen far graver, far greater sins committed and countenanced, even rewarded. But his conscience was not easy. He loved Sophie dearly, despite her strange perversity for saying and doing the very things which made Jack suffer in his marriage, and he had not been deceived by Jack's assurances that Sophie loved him, too, and knew of their great love for each other. It was not a falsehood -- Jack was perfectly incapable of lying even when he attempted it -- but it was a convenient, comforting assurance that relied on no differentiation of the meaning of 'love', no elaboration of how that love manifested itself.

But in truth, he was more troubled on Jack's account than Sophie's. Jack had always been rigid in his naval superstition and tradition; they had often fought because of this. It was true that Jack showed more leniency and pragmatism than other officers -- always for the good of the ship, always to make a happy ship with a crew willing to run out the guns and make sail in doublequick time to face an enemy twice her size. And, despite his probable innocence in the case of the barmaid with the yellow-haired son, Jack's personal morality had that same pragmatism and, to the world's eyes, leniency. But whoring in Madeira or Rio was one thing; buggery quite another. Stephen could not believe that Jack was completely unmoved by the threat of exposure, of ruin, of death. They could be discreet, but the only assurance against consequence was abstinence.

And there was another thought, a care buried under the others but touching a deep, nameless uncertainty. Something elusive -- he almost had it to name it; but there, it was gone again to become only an anxiety among others.

He would miss Jack dearly. He would again writhe unhappily in his bed alone, finding rest with laudanum until his humours had quieted and his work occupied him entirely. But he must send Jack home.

With heavy steps Stephen reached his lodgings, climbed the stairs, sent the landlady and tray of wine and mutton and cheese away, and opened the door. He found Jack sitting at his small table, looking unnaturally large in his hat and cloak, writing and drinking his claret. The scratch-scratch of the quill ceased, and Jack looked up.

"Oh, there you are, Stephen," he said. Stephen gripped the door handle and found he had not yet stepped into his own rooms. He crossed the threshold and let the door close behind him.

Jack smiled a small, false smile Stephen despaired to see. He already felt the floor beneath him rolling, as if on a ship, as if on a volcanic isle ready to burst, as if on a cliff crumbling into the sea. Jack stood up, crumpling the paper in one hand, confirming Stephen's suspicions. "I was just writing you a note, ha ha," Jack said, endeavouring to be embarrassed, but there was a weighty seriousness to him. "I have a ship."

Stephen stared at Jack intently, these words steadying him as he lapsed into an almost detached examination. But it was no lie, he was certain of it. Beneath Jack's uncommon nervousness Stephen detected joy: the unrestrained, simple joy he had witnessed time and again, whenever Jack was close to the sea, about to board. And yet it was a somewhat smothered joy, for Jack still showed the same gravity of being Stephen had witnessed across from the Admiralty.

Stephen smiled at him and said, "My dear, how wonderful! I am happy for you, sure, never happier."

Jack seemed easier at this. He relaxed and, tucking the crumpled note in his waistcoat, he smiled a genuine, warm smile. "It is not the beloved _Surprise_, but a fine thirty-two, not so old, Spanish-built, and they know their way 'round hanging knees for all their other faults. She is called the _Helen of Troy_ now. New masts, new caps. I particularly enquired as to her futtocks, I trust you will be relieved to know -- all sound, very sound."

Stephen's smile was genuine now, too, for nothing was more pleasurable than Jack in his first flush of love for his ship. "I suppose you are to proceed with all speed to this floating maiden, with not a minute to be lost, the Royal Navy being so unhealthily preoccupied with haste," Stephen said.

Jack briefly glanced down at the table, his fingers resting on it. "Well, there is some time, a few days I should think, but, dear Stephen--"

"Ah, brother," said Stephen, interrupting him and raising a hand against whatever fumbling apologetic words Jack had been about to utter. He could not bear to hear them in any event, but could only take a painful satisfaction in speaking them himself. "You must fly to Sophie. Make all a-right, my love, so that she may see you off smiling beneath her tears and praying for your safe return. You must take a chaise. I will ring for the boy and send for one directly. Do you need money for the journey, dear? I have some coins about; they may be English."

"Stephen," Jack said, low, and he stood very close now, for while sending him off Stephen had closed his eyes, quite against his will. He opened them, and Jack was before him, taking his hands and rubbing them. Stephen spread his fingers and threaded them with Jack's, and they held hands for a long silence. Then Stephen let go, took Jack's face in his hands and kissed his brow, bumping against the ridiculous hat. Jack touched Stephen's cheeks and kissed his lips, and for a moment they stood perfectly still, lips barely touching.

Jack drew back, sighing a breath, and smiled softly. "Portsmouth, on the sixteenth. The eighteenth at the latest. If you show up on the nineteenth, you will have to swim after us. I can't say as yet where we go, but I have a fair idea from some hints the First Lord dropped, and I think you may bring some boxes and traps with confidence."

Stephen gazed at him, at once moved to refuse, to claim some prior business, and for an instant wishing some such business existed. But he was slow to convince himself, slower still to convince his mouth to speak the lie, and by then, Jack had already kissed his cheek and departed.

\-----

Jack had hoped to sleep in the chaise, for he was very weary, but he could not settle his thoughts enough to clear his mind. The joy and amazement at the Admiralty -- he knew the _Helen of Troy_ by reputation, had known her former captain as a capable but uninventive man, and he could not wait to get aboard her and check her preventer backstays -- was blotted with uneasiness. That morning he had woken up quite suddenly in the black of night in Stephen's bed to discover that he was alone. A light had shone from the parlour. He had gotten out of bed and followed it, not bothering to cover his nakedness, intent on hauling Stephen back to comfort and warmth, landlady be damned. The coverlet would do for a ruse -- she was a very old, unworldly woman. But his way had been checked at the parlour door, for Stephen was not on the sofa, but at his writing desk, pouring out a dose of laudanum. Jack had seen Stephen dosing patients in times past. This seemed, to Jack's admittedly un-medical eye, more than Stephen had given an amputee. Stephen had not noticed him, had taken the dose and crept back to the sofa. Jack had returned to the bed, and had managed to doze, but fitfully, with vaguely frightening dreams of finding Stephen blackened and wrinkled and cut up badly on an isolated rock, and the _Surprise_ sinking no great distance away.

Waking up early in the morning, he had gone downstairs and was treated with breakfast by the landlady -- a kind woman, entirely unsuspecting, who repeated to him how very glad she was he was staying with Dr Maturin, the doctor needed such a dear friend, she was sure. When he was convinced Stephen must be awake, he had returned, only to find Stephen still asleep on the sofa, a letter in his lap. Jack had recognised the hand immediately -- Diana Villiers, of course -- and with great control kept his neck from craning and tilting to read the words. He had kissed Stephen and left him there to sleep, and had walked to the Admiralty, thinking here was a great mischief, no doubt, and the cause of Stephen's dose. Found himself wondering if Sophie would write and tell him: what had Diana done this time? What new cruelty inflicted upon Stephen? Had worked himself into such a formless, useless hatred that the usually indifferent crowd of men at the Admiralty had stepped aside for him and made room for him to sit. How terrible he must have looked, he reflected, recalling Sophie once admonishing him on his temper, for it did so make his scars glow right demonish.

But after the unexpected, great joy during his meeting with the First Lord, while he was waiting for all the necessary papers and preparations and could cast his mind, now generally easier, back to Stephen's lodgings, he had realised that Diana's letter was the one Stephen had been reading over breakfast the day before. If some cruelty had been inflicted, it was one Stephen had managed to hide for an entire day. Even Stephen, despite his own belief in his immovable nature, should have cracked.

And then, as he was ready with his papers and wishing to return to Stephen as soon as possible, he had met Captain Tryon and Admiral Brettleigh leaving the Admiralty. They had wished him joy of the command; much talk of the _Helen of Troy_, her known strengths; out of politeness her known weaknesses never mentioned; congratulated him on the success of the _Acheron_ \-- damned fine work, one in the eye to old Boney, eh eh? Tryon was a jolly but deeply jealous man; Jack had met him before on land and felt that once had been sufficient. Brettleigh he knew only by reputation. An officer of the older generation, strongly reminiscent of Jack's father. Known throughout the fleet as a woman-hater and great friend of the cat. He was coarse, and in front of the Admiralty itself had not forebore making winking comments about "the great overrated sanctity of marriage, eh, Aubrey? No wonder you ran up to London for a ship so soon, nothing like being back at sea in the company of men."

Jack had stared at the man. Tryon, sensing a rising gale, had told some joke, an unfunny and indecent joke, the kind of thing the flash coves at the club told over their cigars, but it was inoffensive, and had served the purpose. Jack had laughed heartily, and so had Brettleigh, and Jack had been saved from thumping an admiral on the head and ruining his career. As he had walked back to Stephen's, though, his uneasiness had blackened his mood, and his thoughts had turned upon, _Whatever had Brettleigh meant?_

He did not believe Admiral Brettleigh, or anyone else at the Admiralty, knew about him and Stephen. He should never have gotten _Helen of Troy_ otherwise. They might have turned a blind eye, in gratitude for the prodigious great treasure from the _Acheron_, but they would never have given him another command, not with 476 other captains waiting to be posted. Instead, the admiral's words had seemed directed at the state of Jack's marriage, and it pained him to think that, somehow, word of his quarrel with Sophie had spread about and become vulgar gossip. Had the rumour about the barmaid reached London, where it would be credited with ease as a slightly diverting morsel of news? When he thought of men like Brettleigh and Tryon whispering about his wife -- his good, sweet, beautiful Sophie -- he was again filled with a rage, but of a different nature. Here was rage he could direct and form into a useful energy. He would run down to Ashgrove directly, make peace with Sophie, apologise for such harsh words -- had wished them back the moment uttered -- apologise for all of it, even if it was untrue, it mattered not so long as Sophie would embrace him and forgive him before he set sail. There was nothing more unlucky than sailing with an angry wife at home.

He regretted leaving Stephen in so rushed a manner. Indeed, his parting with Stephen had been uncommon melancholy, and this preyed upon his mind as the chaise flew over the green, sleeping land. Finding that Stephen was not at home, he had decided not to wait; waiting might have become lingering, which might have become something else all together. He had wanted to leave a note, but he was no great hand at a letter, and had stared at the blank paper for a quarter of an hour before writing, "Stephen." The rest of the words had not come, formless and elusive as they were.

There was much he should like to say to Stephen, he reflected, but found he could not. It seemed as though when they met alone, they did not need to say the words, but found them in the free conversation of their bodies. And yet, he had seen Stephen taking the laudanum, and a chilly conviction had settled in him during the walk from the Admiralty that _he_ was the cause, the great mischief. Nothing in their free conversation had hinted at this.

Jack watched the dull landscape lighten as dawn approached. Stephen was a deep old file, a closed fellow, a rare bird, to be sure. Perhaps he should always have expected something of this sort: a hidden pain to be dulled. And Stephen was, after all, a Papist and an Irishman, and therefore prone to holding great things in his heart. It was even possible, Jack thought with a sickening pit in his stomach, that Stephen harboured moral objections to the act -- once blithely tolerated in others, now a source of condemnation and self-recrimination for himself. _Good lord_, thought Jack, _I have tempted Adam to the Fall_, and blushed at his own comparison to Eve -- it seemed, under the circumstances, an unhappy if not blasphemous choice.

The miles flew by, and Jack was able to doze for half an hour before the chaise stopped. Return to Ashgrove. Sophie ran to the door in her nightgown, tears in her eyes. Many hugs and kisses. Forgiveness. She had seen the child herself. Not a thing like Jack, her own dear Jack; an ugly little child, poor thing, and eyes not blue at all, it was such stuff. She bit her tongue and stopped short of finding fault in Mrs Williams for fostering the lie, but she did say she could not understand how wicked rumours could be believed when the evidence was so plain. She brought him inside and fed him breakfast, wrapped in her robe. The cottage was very quiet, and Jack's hope that they were alone lifted high, only to be cruelly mauled when Mrs Williams appeared for her tea and toast, sniffing at him and muttering and sitting across from him with her cold, suspicious eyes. He smelled of London, she said, as she should say, he smelled of every vice and sin. But Sophie, dear Sophie, looking very strong now with her chin stuck out and her eyes swollen and red, said, "And so he should, Mama, he having been to London these last days," and brought him another dish of bacon.

He parted from Sophie with a light heart and lifted spirits, though not without some sadness at leaving her alone. She was always sweetest when he was about to go, and so he left feeling a real ache at their separation, though it was an ache deeply submerged by the time he reached the dock at Portsmouth. He was absorbed for the next week with the _Helen of Troy_ \-- fitting her out, manning her, a million problems his mind eagerly grasped and solved. And through it all, at the back of his mind like the tune he hummed without full awareness of it, was the thought, the expectation, the anticipation of seeing Stephen again.

It would be very different on the barky, he thought. On land, of course it must have seemed so vile and vulgar; such intimate things always did. It must of needs have offended Stephen's Papist sensibilites, and at sea, Stephen was less and less a Papist. Nothing like the sea for bringing men into their true selves. Jack was aware that he was dispatching the problem like it was another of the myriad dockyard concerns, and that such simplicity was unlikely to answer for Stephen. But it kept his mind from trouble, it kept his heart from sinking, and it helped him sleep.

The sixteenth came and went. Dr Maturin was never on time, so this was of no great concern. However, as the seventeenth drew to a close, Jack stood at the starboard rail, hands behind his back, and for the first time considered what he would do if Stephen did not show. He was not blind. He had not missed Stephen's look of false happiness when told of the _Helen of Troy_, nor the look of grave regret when Jack had told him to be here on the eighteenth at the latest. He should have felt an awful scrub for dropping those hints about the chances of finding prodigious rare beasts, had they not had the element of truth behind them.

He dined with the port admiral that evening, a cordial, official affair, exceedingly dull despite the excellent wine and the presence of an old friend. He was piped aboard very late, went straight to bed, and awoke with the conflicting emotions of joy and disappointment, for it was the eighteenth and they were to leave port, and Stephen had not shown.

He was on the quarterdeck, drinking coffee and watching the men, making a hundred different notes on how useless or handy they were, and was aware of his officers casting him looks as they called their orders, hoping for approval, prepared for none. It was a good crew, for the most part. Mowett was here as first lieutenant. There were many old Surprises, and a few old Sophies, too, God love them; he did not want to know what they had done to avoid the press-gangs. Killick was standing behind him with the coffee, griping under his breath. There was a pleasant air of comfortableness in the familiar faces, and very few instances of worry or outright fear from the unfamiliar ones. And yet, he found he was not looking forward to the voyage as keenly as he might. Despite the familiar faces, despite the beloved surroundings of wood and tar and rope and sail, he would be very much alone. The captain was holy, it was said...

"Here's something for his holiness now." Impossibly, a grizzled voice had wafted down from the mizzentop, breaking into Jack's thoughts. He looked up, could see nothing but the beautiful lines of backstays and shrouds and some feet, and looked down just as Mr Mowett stepped forward and said, "Sir, I believe that is the doctor in that boat there. Shall we rig a bosun's chair?"

Jack saw the boat, coming nearer, and Stephen among an inexcusable amount of boxes and chests, wearing his outrageous banyan and disreputable straw hat. Now waving it, as if the two-hundred and thirteen men aboard were not all gaping at him already.

"Yes, Mr Mowett," Jack said, unable to check his smile. "Please be so kind as to rig a bosun's chair for the dear doctor."

\-----

Of course he would come. As soon as the door had closed behind Jack, Stephen had known it. It was of no use fighting the inevitable, and he had spent the time left settling certain affairs, completing different studies, arranging things to his satisfaction. He had even stopped at Ashgrove Cottage, to hug and kiss dear Sophie and hear, happily, of the reconciliation. Sophie led him to the garden -- the mostly theoretical garden -- and told him with downcast eyes of Diana's departure. She had gone off to London to be with "that man," as if Stephen would know which of the several possibilities "that man" was. He accepted this with some calm, reflecting on the bitter irony that their paths had surely crossed. The pain was ancient now, nearly buried, although he did accept Sophie's offer to sit down on a log they used for a bench and take some warm tea, for he looked so very pale and sick.

He had arrived in Portsmouth on the seventeenth, early for him, but had spent his final day discreetly enquiring about his shipmates. What sort of men were they? What brutes among them? Who bore the captain ill-will? He discovered very little, but most of what he heard pleased him. He knew a good proportion of the men, and on the whole, they were no worse than the usual lot. And it would be a comfort to Jack, he knew, to have old hands used to their captain's ways, men who knew their way around hanging knees, whatever those were.

Now Stephen was aboard, settled in his cabin, again growing accustomed to the perpetual roll and bounce of the ship around him. He had brought Padeen, and had a surgeon's mate named Mr Miles, a quiet but distressingly timid man, balding. The purser, Mr Haverly, was much given to drink, and the Marine captain, Mr Rowland, suffered from a severe case of venereal hypochrondria. Had already visited Stephen twice, insistent on lowering his pantaloons, all the while cursing the wicked, filthy whores of Portsmouth with whom he had had congress, despite their being wicked and filthy.

He did not see Jack for many days. There were rumours of a French fleet returning from the West Indies. Twice they had cleared for action at the sight of sail; twice Stephen had put away his surgical instruments clean and unused. He had gotten to know the gun-room: Mr Mowett, of course, and Mr Church, the sailing master they had taken on in the _Surprise_ at Valparaíso. An indifferent second lieutenant named Fletcher, in need of Captain Aubrey's fire, in Stephen's opinion. No chaplain, Jack being stubbornly superstitious about having them on board. Stephen had hoped he might know some of the midshipmen, but there were only three, and they looking very young and pale and scared. One a son of one of Jack's old friends -- Stephen reflected upon the remarkable propensity for old friends of Jack's to bear sons which they would then throw into Jack's care at a certain age.

He did not see Jack, except for glimpses on the quarterdeck, in the masts, striding the length of the ship with his glass, smiling and alive with energy, watching the vast sea. Stephen did not have to see him to feel him. Did not the entire ship come alive once her captain was aboard? The men scrambling over her, sure, but without a head, without direction, was it alive? It was a philosophical question he would put to the gun-room sometime over dinner. It needed a nautical mind, and he could not ask it of Jack and get an unbiased answer, he thought with a smile. Jack would deny it outright, and say that the ship was always alive, and so she always was -- for Jack.

Stephen did not have to see him to feel him. At night, in his swinging hammock, the creaks and groans of the ship around him, and the rising smell of salt and tar and wood and men and rum -- he closed his eyes and set his book aside and felt Jack around him, that great warmth which spread into his body in a soothing glow. He could taste Jack's lips and hair, the rough saltiness of his fingertips, feel Jack's breath upon him. His mind was comforted by the remembrance of touch, kisses, taste, and Jack's warm, worldly, gentle laughter. But his body yearned for the remembrance to be made real. His body was selfish and foolish, he scolded himself, though it did little to ease his longing.

The gun-room dined in the captain's great cabin once they were certain the threat (or promise) of a French fleet was remote. Jack was happy, generous, untroubled. Stephen could not take his eyes off of him except when duty-bound by courtesy. Jack was more bound by duty, but met Stephen's eyes and smiled at him and laughed with him often.

The evening had ended with Jack toasting their destination, now revealed: they were to sail into the Indian Ocean, and they would stop in Mozambique, where the doctor would find all manner of remarkable beasts. The officers of the gun-room smiled politely, lifting their glasses in Stephen's direction. Stephen detected a coldness, however, and looked at Jack wonderingly, touched but horribly dismayed that he should accept such a command without thrill, without hope of distinction, on Stephen's account. But Jack could not deceive, could not hold back. His eyes -- sparkling, brilliantly blue -- gave it away before he announced the real purpose: to rendezvous with the _Noble_, the _Galway_, and the _Pax Regis_ and find the French men-of-war who had been harassing the East India Company. Now the officers toasted heartily, made merry by the prospect of action, of prizes, and of the showering of gifts of gratitude by the Company.

Word soon spread to the men, and they happily exercised their guns long into the night, and if they cursed their captain, their Lucky Jack, who would not tolerate any wanton shabbiness or idle stupidity, they cursed him whistling and smiling, their fortunes already spent in their hearts. It was, by and large, a happy ship. Jack was happy, and Stephen delighted in it. They soon took to their music, resumed with a strong, powerful sense of rightness and comfortable familiarity.

\-----

"Stephen," Jack said one sunset evening, setting down his violin. "Have I shown you the quarter gallery yet?"

Stephen was worrying at one of his strings. He said, "I will assume, dear heart, that you do not mean the privy. No, you have not yet shown me the quarter gallery, but no doubt I will amaze you if I say that I can see it. Quite plainly. From this very seat."

Jack smiled and rocked on his feet, unable to contain his anticipatory energy. "Amazed I am, dear Stephen. No. I meant you should see inside it."

Stephen rose with assumed reluctance, an indulgent look on his face which Jack was charmed to see. Jack drew back the canvas curtain for Stephen, who stepped inside.

"Ain't you surprised? Amazed?" Jack asked, following him. "Those Spaniards liked a flash cabin, I mark, and did not spare the quarter galleries. Airy, too." He ran a hand over a beam, smiling at Stephen's pleasure. It was a very fine little room of windows, glowing now in pink sunset. The corner-shaped bench was the Spaniards' doing; Jack's chief alteration had been to install a glass for viewing the sky. This he now touched and said to Stephen, "I believe it will prove a great, undisturbed location for viewing birds. I've told the sentry to admit you any time, any time you like."

Stephen sat down and eagerly looked through the glass, though the sun was gone. "My dear, it is a wonderful space! So healthy, too, with these clean airs. I wonder that it is so big. It is nearly the size of my cabin."

Jack gazed fondly at him and sat down. He placed his hand over Stephen's, resting on Stephen's knee, and said, "It is big enough to sling a hammock across." He found that he was warm, and that his fingers trembled a little as they held Stephen's. He could not understand it, except as the force of his love and affection shaking him bodily.

Stephen turned his hand over and wove their fingers together. He looked out the window as he said, "I understand your meaning, my dear. Would not these fine, magnificent windows, however, provide somewhat of a too clear view? With so many men about, peering inside." His voice was low, and his precision with words caused Jack's smile to fade.

"Only when she's being cleaned, repaired, or painted," Jack pointed out reasonably. "But as to that, of course the windows can be shut with hatches. Just so," he said, demonstrating on one window with his left hand. "But it ain't so very exposed, Stephen. Nothing can be rigged over the quarterdeck or taffrail without I know about it. And look," he cried, letting go of Stephen's hand and standing by the door. "The handy thing with a canvas door is that it can be tied." He showed Stephen his other innovation -- three pairs of hooks running either side of the bulkhead door. "As private as you please."

He untied the canvas and pushed it open, letting the light from the cabin inside. Stephen was looking at him, quiet, thoughtful. Jack found he was nervous. Reflected how poorly he had displayed this prize to Stephen. Indeed, he had intended -- he had hoped -- it would be their private room, but even were it not, it was still a wonderful space, and he was truly happy to offer it to Stephen, for observations if for nothing else. Sweat beaded under his open collar. He had offered it as gracelessly as a brothel madam might offer her girls. He might as well have placed vulgar red velvet cushions on the bench.

Abashed, he sat down next to Stephen and took his hand again. He said uncertainly, "I mean to say..." But the words were not there; he was no great hand with words sometimes, and hated to feel so stumbling when it was so important to get them right. The surest way of saying it was not with words. He touched Stephen's chin and kissed him gently. Calmed by the taste of Stephen's lips -- so longed for, always -- he said, "It is your room, for whatever you wish."

Stephen looked at him affectionately, but with a kind sadness that made Jack take a deep, steadying breath. Stephen drew back a very little way and sighed. "I have told you that I consider a promise to be binding, and so I do. And yet I have broken promises I made to myself, repeatedly broken them. Promises concerning you."

"Concerning me?" cried Jack, his mind racing with numerous possible promises, each more wretched than the last. Promises broken? It sounded very black, very severe. The light and breezy quarter gallery became a pit; Jack was sure he would end up in the ocean if this falling feeling would not stop.

"Yes, and I have not known whom to blame. If I blame you, I am doing you an injustice. If I blame myself, I am pitiful and false; a blackguard." Stephen spoke very calmly, but he looked down at Jack's hand upon his. Jack watched him, feeling such emotion like a roiling sea, a warm sea, pulling him in and casting him about. The dim glow from the great cabin made Stephen's face a pale yellow with sharp shadows, but his lips were soft. Jack knew how soft, and longed to touch them. He watched the dark thin line of Stephen's eyelashes fall and rise as Stephen blinked.

"Dear," said Jack, lifting Stephen's hand and kissing it. "Have you not considered how very impossible it would be to keep a promise concerning another person, without that person knows of it?"

Stephen looked up and gazed at him for a great while. "That is indeed so." He touched Jack's cheek gently and dropped his hand. "I should not have made promises I was unwilling to keep. And yet, at the time, I believed I could master my weaknesses."

He spoke so wistfully, so regretfully, that Jack stirred uneasily. He squeezed Stephen's fingers and looked down at the floor. "I suppose I am your weakness," he said, very low.

He felt Stephen's kiss on his cheek. Stephen withdrew his hand from Jack's grasp and embraced him, saying with a sigh, "And my very great strength. You are a blessed conundrum, a beautiful paradox, a riddle for wise pandits and Brahmans."

Jack thought Stephen much more like a riddle, especially when he spoke like this, but he could not mistake the great affection and fondness in Stephen's voice and was comforted by it. He leaned into Stephen's embrace. Stephen kept his arm across his back and dropped one hand to Jack's lap, caressing his knee.

Jack lifted Stephen's hand and touched his lips to each knuckle. "I said once that I cared not what we did, so long as we were together. I do still mean it, my love," he said with as much honesty as he could. He would mind it very little, he was sure, if Stephen was resolved to chastity. Although his heart and his body were in agreement in this instance, he was aware from past experiences that it was not always so. One could lead, and the other could obey. He kissed Stephen's fingertips. "You are joy to my heart. Just stay by me."

Stephen slid his fingers from Jack's and stroked Jack's hair. "Yes, of course. Where else would I be, for all love?"

Jack looked at him, warmth rising through his skin, and his spirits flew at seeing Stephen's gentle, fond smile. He touched his fingers to it and caressed Stephen's lips, thinking on their softness, their sweet curves, when they were wry, when they were stubborn, when they parted and showed teeth and expelled a harsh, surprised breath at the moment of -- at a very, very intimate moment. This thought turned his warmth to heat, and Jack shifted. The airy little gallery now seemed quite close and humid.

He lowered his hand, only for Stephen to take it up again and kiss his fingers. Jack hesitated and looked away, frowning at the floor, not knowing how to say his mind so plainly without it seeming coarse.

"I tell you what it is, Stephen," he said at last in a low tone. "I had not expected to like it so very much, you know." He moved his gaze to Stephen, and seeing the look of shocked dismay on Stephen's face, he added rapidly, "And yet I wished for it, with all my heart, do not think otherwise, dear." He kissed Stephen's hand again, and rubbed his fingers, and thought he saw the dismay fade, although Stephen was being damned close just now, damned inscrutable.

"What I mean to say is, should you wish us to be chaste now, I will understand. We never spoke of it, not really, and I daresay I came at you unawares, without hoisting my pennant, as you might say." He was speaking quietly but quickly; rambling, he felt, but he did not stop. Stephen was saying nothing and not moving, and Jack believed that silence now would be lethal for them, though in truth, he barely knew what he was saying. "We were so close to England, you see, and I could not be sure when I would see you again -- you are a wretch at answering invitations, you know; even Sophie says so -- and I wanted to give you a remembrance, I suppose. And of course I was rather drunk at the time, else no doubt I should have considered that you might not have wanted it, though I do not recall you ever told me so. But in the end, it appears that I was the one with the remembrance, for I thought on it much. Still do, of course..." Jack felt he was a-lee, in danger of shoaling. "What I mean is, dear Stephen, you made your promises, and it seems that unknowingly I broke them for you, and I value you so much that I will abide it if you find it is quite impossible to continue. I want you by me, even chastely. Although you must know I do so enjoy it... I had never expected... It is so very... So very..." Jack found he was not completing his sentences, for Stephen had started kissing him.

An interval of kisses -- such tender kisses, yet with some fire to them, and Jack recognised this fire in Stephen, for Stephen's passions were now as familiar to him as his own. Stephen tied the canvas door, and complimented Jack on his ingenuity, for the hooks also served to hold his waistcoat, stockings, and breeches. The fine Spanish bench, though narrow, was wide enough for one to recline on. Quickly undressed, Jack stretched out, naked, and Stephen, in his shirt, climbed over him, sitting on his belly. Jack caressed him under his shirt and lifted it off.

"The windows are quite open," Stephen murmured, shivering pleasurably at Jack's touches.

Jack smiled and stretched beneath him as Stephen's fingertips skimmed his throat and chest and traced his scars. "No repairs, cleaning, or painting tonight. There is nothing outside but the Atlantic," he said, surreptitiously touching wood and glancing past Stephen's shoulder to see only a purple-blue sky still starless. "And the air is so clear and fresh tonight."

"So it is, indeed," said Stephen, sliding low to kiss him. Jack folded his arms around him, very easy and comfortable in the confined tangle of legs and arms. Around the spark of his arousal a pleasant laziness had descended, and he contentedly glided his hands over Stephen in slow caresses and delighted in Stephen's precise, loving touches.

"A fine breeze," Jack said into Stephen's ear, between kisses. "We might take a turn on deck."

Stephen's lips stroked his neck, causing a slow, tingling ripple through his limbs. "And so we will, my dear. After," he said, kissing him. "After..."

(the end)

**Author's Note:**

> 1) _Dei rident_: "The gods laugh"   
> 2) The chronology of the movie can't be reckoned accurately with the books, so I have taken a lot of license here. It is probably 1806 or 1807, and Jack is married to Sophie but not yet a father. Diana is still in England (or perhaps has returned to England), but is unattached, although Jack and Sophie are certain they know how Diana and Stephen feel for each other.


End file.
